Smokers who embrace hookah cafés as a safe way to relax have few reasons to breathe easy. In crowded hookah bars, haze is expected, but health risks, it seems, are not.
Most of us believe hookah is harmless, only because the vapory smoke smells and tastes better than cigarettes.
Let's kill a few myths up front. The Mayo Clinic, World Health Organization and American Cancer Society warn that hookah is no safer than cigarettes. The smoke from tobacco used in hookah contains the same carcinogens as any other tobacco smoke. The water pipe does not magically filter out the toxins. Depending on the temperature at which hookah burns in a water pipe, less tar may be released, but the concentrations of carbon monoxide and heavy metals in hookah smoke are typically as high or higher than cigarette smoke.
The Centers for Disease Control estimate hookah smokers inhale 100 to 200 times the volume of smoke of a cigarette in an hour. Carbon monoxide levels in hookah bars can be hazardous as well.
Cigarette smokers light up, puff away for a few minutes and go back to work. Hookah smokers sit in smoky rooms for hours, inhaling over and over. Even if you pass the pipe among a few friends, you're still breathing in a lot of smoke.
It's hard to pin down exactly how much smoke the average user inhales. Differences in tobacco blends, charcoal, type of water pipe and ventilation cause different levels of exposure to toxins. Using hookah hasn't been studied as much as smoking cigarettes. Still, it's safe to say that you'd be better off smoking a cigarette or two than hanging out at The Pyramids on a busy night.
I hit up the employees of Athens Pyramids for information about hookah from those who love it most. The man I talked to declined comment, stating previous Post coverage about hookah scared patrons away.
Hookah bars give underage students a legal environment and provide a place for them to relax and socialize, but there's little evidence it's harmless. Given the widespread belief that hookah is mild, natural and non-toxic, many students consider it safe. But if you wouldn't smoke a cigarette, you shouldn't smoke hookah.
In the case of hookah, our own ignorance may be the greatest health risk. In most of Ohio's smoke-free bars, you can avoid secondhand smoke. But hookah has flown under the radar for a while, thanks to widespread ignorance.
It's about time to admit we like smoking. If you do it recreationally, eh, so what? There's a health risk. It's comparable to cigarettes. Depending on how you smoke, that could mean a couple cigarettes or a pack.
Smoking is in style again, at least for the nonconformist crowds. Years after many of us suffered through the D.A.R.E. program, the coolness of throwing caution aside is increasing. And the combination of booze and cigarettes keeps my friends lighting up.
After all these years of carcinogen threats, preventative screenings and health obsession worthy of Chicken Little, we're tired of obsessing about health. Everything causes cancer, so why worry? Shrugging off health for a night is cathartic.
The difference between these risks and hookah is both labeling and knowledge. Hookah doesn't come with a surgeon general's warning. It doesn't seem as bad as cigarettes, doesn't come with warning labels and may well carry an invisible, hefty price.
Robin Donovan is a graduate student studying journalism and columnist for The Post. Tell her why you smoke at rd253609@ohiou.edu
4 Opinion
Robin Donovan
